“He made plays,” Williams said. “We didn’t get out there and guard him like I would have hoped. You’ve got to get up and make that shot more difficult.”

Mann entered the game 1-for-16 on 3-pointers this season.

“Sandbagging,” he said.

But his coach was fine with his 5-for-14 long-range effort.

“He’s so darn cocky,” Byrd said. “He was never going to stop thinking they were going to go in.”

North Carolina rallied in the second half behind relentless offensive rebounding, but 26 missed free throws and a costly turnover in the final minute were too much to overcome.

“We definitely knew what we were getting into coming into the game,” said junior forward James Michael McAdoo, who scored a career-high 27 points for the Tar Heels. “A great shooting team that wasn’t going to make mistakes.”

The game was part of the Hall of Fame Tipoff tournament, though the teams were headed to different predetermined brackets later this week in New England anyway.

North Carolina trailed 55-44 with less than 14½ minutes to play before surging ahead. Paige’s 3-pointer with 8:23 left gave the Tar Heels a 62-60 edge as the team was on its way to 14 consecutive points. Belmont was amid a field-goal drought of nearly seven minutes.

Brice Johnson’s dunk with about 4:42 left pushed the edge to 71-65 and those were the Tar Heels’ only fast-break points of the game.

Mann’s 3-pointer with 1:01 remaining drew the Bruins within 78-75. After two Paige free throws, Mann connected on another 3 with 52.9 seconds left.

A North Carolina turnover on Paige’s fumble with 20 seconds left gave the Bruins a chance and Mann converted with another 3 at the 13.1-second mark.

Belmont led 41-34 at halftime, aided by North Carolina’s 9-for-28 free-throw shooting. McAdoo’s 12 points at the time helped keep the Tar Heels within range.

“It was a big part of it,” Williams said of missed foul shots. Tokoto was 4-for-16 from the line.

The Bruins were content with perimeter shooting. They didn’t attempt a shot inside the 3-point arc until more than 6½ minutes into the game.

Paige ended up with 17 points and Johnson had 14. North Carolina grabbed 21 offensive rebounds, while Belmont had 29 total rebounds.

North Carolina remains without potential starters P.J. Hairston and Leslie McDonald awaiting an NCAA ruling. That didn’t matter to the Tar Heels.

“I didn’t expect to lose,” Paige said. “We didn’t have any intentions of losing this game.”